Welcome

Our aim is simple: to help English speaking vegans in Japan stay vegan.

Being vegan in Japan, while far from impossible, presents new challenges to even the most experienced vegan. For example, food that is usually vegan, like bread, suddenly contains animal products. Food labels also become practically unreadable unless you have a good understanding of Japanese, including knowledge of many complex kanji. Navigating the local supermarket or convenience store can become a matter of guesswork, which is clearly less than ideal for a vegan.

We would like to help by sharing the information we have gathered so that others don’t have to ‘reinvent the wheel’. There is a lot of great vegan food here, but it is often difficult for foreigners to identify, simply because they don’t have a good enough understanding of Japanese. We want to help break through the language barrier.

Where information appears to be lacking is in relation to packaged and convenience foods, as well as cooking ingredients (for those of us living in Japan and cooking for ourselves). While there is quite a lot of general information around about the presence of animal products in almost everything in Japan, there is little practical information about the specific products that are and aren’t vegan. We want to try to help fill that gap.

We have started with some of the most common foods in Japan. You will see there are photos of the products to make them easier to recognise, as well as translations of the ingredient panels. We have included products that you may expect to be vegan, but which aren’t. Unfortunately there are some mystery ingredients like ‘flavouring’ that we cannot identify.

In addition, emulsifiers can be made of different things, including plants, dairy, or occasionally meat ingredients like pork. It’s not typical for Japanese labels to identify what source their emulsifier comes from, unless it’s made of soy. In that case it will often read 乳化剤、大豆由来/nyuukazai, daizu yuurai, or emulsifier-soy origin.

Also, unfortunately white sugar in Japan is still sometimes made using the old method of whitening using animal bone char as a filter to whiten the sugar. The animal bone char does not remain as an ingredient in the final product, so it’s not possible to tell if bone char was used by reading the label on the product. Where we have any information on if bone char was used or not, we will include it in our description of the product. There is no current consensus in vegan groups in Japan on if sugar made with bone char is non-vegan or not. You will therefore find white sugar in the items recommended in vegan Facebook Japan-related groups, at items sold at some vegan festivals (but not all) and in items marked as vegan at some restaurants (but not all, especially not at macrobiotic restaurants or 100% vegan restaurants).

As in other countries, it is sometimes necessary to contact the manufacturer to determine whether a product is vegan. This is something we’re working on also.

We have included information on animal testing wherever available, however this information is not comprehensive.

As time goes on this site will continue to grow, so please check in with us every so often as well as join us at our Facebook group Is it vegan? (Japan) for more up-to-the moment information, as well as to ask if specific products are vegan.

We hope we can help you stay vegan while in Japan.

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16 thoughts on “Welcome”

Hello 🙂 Just moved to Japan for a year, and REALLY Happy to find your website! The ingredient list is going to be so helpful, thank you so much for all your time and effort. Now to go and learn all that list… ganbatte ne… 🙂 Will most definitely try and contribute as my Japanese gets betters along with my knowledge of what vegan can eat or not here.
Hey, is there a vegan society or something like this in Japan?

Thank you!! I have just added some information about vegan festivals and groups in Japan. There is the Japan Vegetarian Society, which is vegan and vegetarian, and it looks like there was a Japan Vegan Society at some point, however the website is currently under reconstruction. It might be better to try to join a local vegan meet-up group if there is one near you. Good luck!!

Thank you so much for sharing all the vegan-friendly information here.

I am Jan, a vegetarian from Thailand and currently a research student Waseda University. Though I am not a complete vegan (I can’t quite give up milk, so I label myself vegetarian), I find this blog super helpful!

I am doing a little survey for my Japanese course here, about the difficulty and more flexible options of eating out as a vegetarian in Japan. Could you please spare 5-10 minutes and help me fill out my short questionnaire here? I know most things can already be found on this blog, but I would be very grateful if you could help me fill in the form personally.

Hi! Do you know if mitoku natto spores for making natto are grown on a dairy based culture, or on a plant based culture?
I tried emailing the Yuzo Takahashi laboratory myself, but never got a clear answer. I’m vegan and I make my own natto, this is one product I’m not sure about…

Hello! I’ve been living here for 5 years and this year im slowly transitioning my self into vegan lifestyle. I’m glad ive found this site as I’m still having hard time reading Japanese. I hope I can learn alot from this site and maybe contribute some stuff aswell. Eager to meet people that can inspire and coach me along the way of my transition. Hoping for this site to prosper!

Hey everyone!
I work on a cruise ship and I visit many Japanese ports (Nagasaki, fukuoka, kumamotos etc) I want to get a few groceries for my cabin (margerines, spreads, snacks, crackers, crisps, sweet treats) if people could tell me very easily accessible brands out there for the basics would love to here them, pictures might help? And whish supermarket you went to!
Any help is appreciated! Loving this journey!
Follow me @samueljamesdoherty

Hello! We recommend our Facebook group, Is it vegan? (Japan), and the unrelated Facebook group Vegan Supermarket Finds in Japan for updated information about where people are finding specific products. Also please check the Dairy Alternatives section of this website for pictures of some margarines and spreads. https://isitveganjapan.com/food-products/soy-milk/ We also have a section for potato, corn, and vegetable chips here: https://isitveganjapan.com/food-products/potato-and-corn-chips/ Will be adding information about crackers soon. The Convenience Stores section of this website also has a lot of pictures of snack foods.

Hi. I’ve just heard about your blog today. I haven’t looked every topics yet, but it’s really helpful, so thank you so much! I live in Japan for 20 about years, vegan for about 5 years. I can tell how it’s hard to find REAL vegan products . It’ s very frustrating. Especially compared to France where I’m from, the vegan products and menus are everywhere. Here, some people don’t even know what “vegan” mean… I think the way is still long to have a large choice of vegan products in Japan and to make the people realize the cruel reality behind animal products. But I don’t give up! 😉 THANK YOU again!

We’re so glad you find it helpful. As for made-in-Japan products, We currently have Ohsawa Ramen, Samurai Ramen and T’s cup noodles in the Noodles and Pasta section and Sagamiya Mascarpone-style “cheese” and CHOICE “cheese” and “butter” in the Non-Dairy Butter, Cheese, Cream, Margarine & Yoghurts sections listed as products that are explicitly sold as vegan. There are also more import products sold as vegan such as Provamel soymilks- we’ve detailed these in the Natural Lawson section and the Soy, Almond, & Other Non-Dairy Milks section. Also, Bio C Bon is expanding in the Kanto area, so we now have some access to some of those French vegan products.